Open Writing

Slowly, the mists begin to clear. There is a fuzziness
that remains, that refuses to disperse, even though a part
of him knows it should. How he knows this is lost in the
mist, and he intuits that there are other things that are
also lost. But he does not know how he knows that.

His head begins to ache with the effort of
remembering, and the room starts to spin. He blinks
several times until, finally, the mist over his eyes clears;
this, at least, is familiar. He knows that he has done this
before, like this, but not exactly the same. But what it is
that is different he does not know.

Slowly, the room comes into focus as his vision
continues to improve. Again, that brief impression of
familiarity, of déjà vu, flickers at the corners of his
fragmented consciousness. Sensations begin to register:
soft light in his eyes, painless and non-threatening, one
side of his face resting in something cool and soothing,
turning now, seeing the face looking back at him. Is it a
mirror? Is it him? No, something tells him it is not, and he
does not know how he knows.

But there is one thing he does know: this is not how he
is. Something is wrong, wrong with him, although what it
might be he does not know. Nor does he know where he is,
exactly, but if he strains really hard, stretches his mind
until he thinks it will explode under the pressure, he sees
flashes: a towering pillar of fire, bright lights in the sky,
brighter than any he has ever seen. And hidden in there,
way back in the deepest part of him, a face; kind, old and
beautifully black. Just like him.

He starts then, brought back by this revelation. He is
black! What does that mean? Where is he? Who is he?
What? Why?

Dimly, he becomes aware of sounds, of voices coming
from outside the place where he is. He realizes that there
are words being spoken, and he can understand some of
them. But they sound strange; even though he cannot
remember anything about the time before, he is somehow
sure that the words were never meant to sound like this.

“I think he’s coming round,” says the voice. He turns
his head and raises his hand, and is absurdly pleased to
see that memory has not failed him; he is black, or rather,
a light coffee color that stands out against the white of the
place where he is lying. He focuses on the face above him
and tries to smile. The figure looming over him reaches
out a hand, whiter than his own, and gently touches his
forehead, and he sees that its eyes are moist, as are his
own. He does not know what that means, but he feels it
might not be bad.

* * *

Holly withdrew her hand and blinked her own tears
away as she watched the face of the man she had
awakened. Exactly what the state of his mind was, she did
not know, but she was reasonably sure of one thing:
psychopaths did not shed such a poignant tear as this man
had, nor did they have such beautiful, soulful eyes. If the
eyes are really the windows to the soul, then Caleb Strong
could be a saint.

“Give me a run-down on his condition as soon as you
can, Doc,” she said to the computer. “Meanwhile, I’ll see
if he can answer a few simple questions.”

She turned back to the man in the cell again and
studied him for a moment. He was a light brown color, an
American of African descent, and he appeared quite tall,
although it was difficult to tell while he was lying down.
He was also, she noted with a flush, very handsome, and
his body was lean and lightly muscled. And lower down,
that part….Blushing, she looked back at his face, then
leaned towards him and spoke.

“Caleb,” she said, slowly and clearly. “Can you
understand me?”

The man said nothing; he continued to watch her with
those brown eyes, but Holly thought she saw something, a
spark way back inside, and she tried again. “Caleb, please
try to understand, I need you to understand me.” Holly
paused, fighting back a feeling of panic. Oh God, please
don’t let him be like the others, please…

* * *

Caleb hears the words and knows he must respond.
Desperately, he struggles to find the words himself, the
right words that he instinctively knows are there, like
some kind of ritual, a dance that people do when they
want to communicate. He does not consciously think of it
in this way, of course; such things are beyond him, but the
concept, the idea, is definitely there. He only has to find
it.

He concentrates with all his strength on the figure
leaning over him. She looks nice, he wants to please her,
and he strives with all of his might to make the sounds he
instinctively knows she wants to hear. His vocal cords,
hoarse after decades of disuse creak and groan like the
timbers of an old house as he endeavors to perform the
basic function of vocal communication.

Suddenly, without warning or even a reason, the words
are there.

* * *

“ ’ere am ah? Wha iz ziz p’ace? Wazza madda wi’
me?”

Holly gasped, her hand flying to her faceplate. Then
the gasp became a smile, and then she was laughing, tears
welling up in her eyes. She sagged with relief inside her
suit, hanging motionless at the second level of cells in
Sleep Center Four. Quickly, she got herself under control.

“Take it easy, Caleb, you’re going to be okay. Doc,
you got that physical yet?”

“Ready now, Holly.”

She turned back to the man in the cell and watched the
screen on the sleeve of her suit for a moment. “Okay,
Caleb. We’re going to get you out of there. Do you think
you can do it?”

Caleb stared at her for a moment, then slowly nodded.
Holly breathed another sigh of relief. “Great, that’s great,
Caleb. We’ll get you to the showers, then into some clean
clothes. You must be feeling like a shower, huh?”

Caleb nodded and smiled. “Ungy,” he said.

Holly grinned. “I’ll just bet you are. We’ll take care of
that too.”

Thank God, she thought. He seems to understand me,
and I can understand him. She took his hand and began to
draw him out of the cell. At first, he resisted, but she
soothed him with soft words and gentle actions, and
slowly he relaxed and allowed himself to move towards
her. Not having had any experience with the mentally
handicapped, Holly had decided to treat him like one of
the many first grade children she had taught. So far, it
seemed to be working.

Gently, she eased him out of his cell, the cushioning
gel still clinging to him. There was a moment when his
instincts reacted to being apparently unsupported twelve
feet above the deck. His eyes bulged, and he began to
thrash around in his panic. Holly held him as tightly as
she could, speaking to him in soft, reassuring tones,
telling him it was all right, it’s all right Caleb,
everything’s all right, you can’t fall, don’t you remember,
Caleb? You can’t fall, nobody falls here.

Gradually, seeing that he remained in mid-air and did
not fall, Caleb began to calm down. His breathing slowed,
and his features relaxed, and after a few minutes he
allowed Holly to lead him out of the sleep center. All the
while, she kept up a steady stream of talk, telling him that
he was safe, that everything was all right and wasn’t this
fun, just like flying.

Forty-five minutes later, Holly and Caleb were in the
children’s recreation center immediately aft of the bridge.
Holly was watching the man trying to come to terms with
weightlessness; in general, he was making a better fist of
it than most normal adults would, she thought, given the
same situation. Like a child, he accepted things as they
were, and did not attempt to ponder what he could not
understand. Instead, he surrendered to sensation, and gave
himself up to the wonder of every child’s (and, if truth be
told, every adult’s) dream: being able to fly.

Gleefully, and with increasing abandon, he swooped
and glided, dipped and rolled, turning somersaults in the
air and delighting in the freedom of his environment.
Watching him, Holly found his joy infectious, and after a
few minutes joined him in his cavorting. Together they
bounced off walls, padded for the protection of those for
whom the room was originally intended, dived through
hoops that hung from the ceiling and swooped along
tunnels of brightly colored plastic. In this way they passed
a carefree half hour or so, until Holly was able to
persuade Caleb that it was time to get something to eat.

Reluctantly, like a child who recognizes the logic in
what an adult is saying, but does not want the fun to end,
Caleb finally agreed, and he allowed Holly to lead him
out of the rec. center. Together they drifted through the
corridors to the nearest kitchen. The easy part was over;
next would come the difficult task of convincing Caleb
that he could help her, something of which even Holly
herself was not entirely certain.

With the smiling man in tow, Holly went in search of a
meal.

* * *

Sitting across the table in the dining room, Holly
watched Caleb eat while she also enjoyed the first proper
meal she had had in days. Their magnetic plates were held
in place in the zero-gee of the midships dining room, and
she had shown him how to slip his feet into the recesses
set into the floor under the table, which prevented him
from floating away.

While she watched, she tried again to think of him as a
small child, one for whom she had responsibility. She
thought that as long as she could do that, she might be
able to help in his improvement. That he was improving,
she had no doubt; nevertheless, she knew she had to be
realistic. Caleb was, she knew, never going to be more
than five or six years old, in his mind, ever again.

Physically, however, he was something else entirely.
He was a man; that much had become very evident in the
shower, and she now knew she would have to be very
careful with him and any future awakees. She had needed
to show him everything, including how to wash himself,
and for a short time things had threatened to get totally
out of hand. Sitting and watching Caleb attack his second
helping of bacon and eggs, Holly flushed at the memory.

Never a prude about sex, despite her own inexperience,
Holly had shown Caleb how to soap his body, including
his genitals. They had been standing together in the
shower; Holly had found it necessary to get in with him,
and had stripped off her clothes, still thinking of him as a
child. Once there, she had begun lathering his groin.

At first, Caleb had giggled, responding the way a child
would to tickling. Then, as Holly continued, he had gone
very quiet. She had raised her head and seen him looking
at her, a serious expression on his handsome face, and for
a moment Holly forgot who he was. They were very
close, and Holly smelled his man-smell. She had closed
her eyes, and was on the brink of surrendering herself to
the sexual sensation when she suddenly realized what she
was doing.

Gently, she tried to push him away, but one of his arms
snaked around her waist and pulled her to him. She placed
a hand on his chest and looked down between their bodies
and saw that he was fully aroused. Her hand was still
grasping his penis, only now it was huge, bigger than
anything she had ever seen, or even imagined before.

Unsure of what to do, but knowing that she couldn’t
leave him in that condition, that he wouldn’t understand,
Holly maintained a slight distance between them while
she gently pushed his foreskin back, uncovering the large,
purple head. Caleb’s hands reached for her, trying to pull
her closer, but she resisted him firmly, all the while
keeping up the rhythmical stroking. Holly looked down at
him; she had very little experience in these matters, but
even she knew that men didn’t get much bigger than this,
that Caleb was very well-endowed.

Gently, Holly placed her other hand behind his head
and drew him close to her, feeling his chin above her head
and her breasts pressing against his smooth chest, and
hearing his breathing starting to become more ragged and
urgent. Caleb clutched at her shoulder and gasped, and
Holly felt him jerk in her hand as his warm fluid spurted
on to her thighs. She held him tightly and stroked him
until he was quiet, then she moved away and let the
shower wash them both. Neither of them spoke, and when
they were clean and dry they dressed and left the shower
room.

Now, sitting in the canteen watching him eat, and
picking at her own food, Holly worried that Caleb would
think that such behavior was the norm, that such things
happened with every shower. Her sense of what was right
and proper told her that they must not do it again, and
somehow she would have to make certain he understood.
But how?

She couldn’t tell him that it was bad, or wrong; it
wasn’t true, and he might even know that. Because it
wasn’t as if she had taken advantage of his condition; in
fact, it was almost the other way around or, at the very
least, mutual. She found him, physically, very attractive,
and her shattered soul had yearned for some human
contact ever since the accident. Still, she had to keep
telling herself he was only a child in his mind, even if he
had all the natural urges of a man, and somehow she
would have to deal with that.

Because, if she was completely honest with herself,
and she always tried to be, then she had to admit that she
had enjoyed it, too. Holding his massive cock (she
blushed as the word came, unbidden, into her mind) in her
hand she had found herself being carried away with
desire, and had felt a wetness inside that had not been
caused by the shower. She was honest enough to admit
that she had, for a moment, wanted to push him down and
somehow get that monster inside her, then just let him do
whatever he wanted to do. But she hadn’t, and right now
she didn’t know whether she was sorry or not.

After they finished their meal, Holly led Caleb back to
the computer center. He followed her docilely enough,
floating along behind her, and seemed to have accepted
their unscheduled shower activities as a child would:
without question, assuming such behavior to be the norm.
Somehow, she knew she would have to explain to him
that it was not, and that it must not be repeated.

Despite her earlier reasoning, she still had very guilty
feelings about it, as though she had taken advantage of a
child. Part of her knew that this was not strictly true, that
they had both been carried away in the heat of the
moment. However, she had heard stories of men who had
molested women in mental institutions, and she had felt
nothing but contempt for them. Now here she was, doing
what could be construed to be almost the same thing.

The fact that Caleb had undoubtedly enjoyed it
mitigated only slightly in her favor; certainly, he was
none the worse for the experience. In fact, he seemed
quite docile and relaxed, and whenever she looked at him
she found that same, adoring puppy-dog look fixed on
her. That had been there before the shower, and had not
altered.

Of course, it was only natural that he should feel love
towards her, like a child for its mother. Sure, she told
herself, but mothers don’t behave the way you did. What
were you thinking of? She admonished herself again, and
resolved once more not to repeat the shower scene, but
still she found herself thinking of how it had been, and
what might have happened if….Stop it, that’s enough! she
thought angrily. He’s a child, only a child. Think of him
in that way, and take cold showers. It’ll pass. Freshly
resolved, she led her charge into the presence of the
Doctor.